Strange Function Happenings

kbc1

Hi all

I am calling a function inside a while loop and if certain criteria is met, the function is called again within itself. The while loop is below:

while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
	$sectionid 	= $row['sectionid'];
	$title 		= $row['name'];
	$url 		= $row['url'];		// friendly url string e.g. about-us or contact-us etc
	$childof	= $row['childof'];	// the Parent record sectionid

$securl 	= hasChildren($SECTIONS, $url, $childof);
// echo $securl;

echo "\t\t\t<li><a class=\"notactive\" href=\"$securl\" title=\"$title\">$title </a></li>\n";
}
mysql_free_result($result);

The hasChildren function is as follows:

function hasChildren($SECTIONS, $passedurl, $childof) {
	if ($childof < 7) {
		$securl 	= 	$SECTIONS['url'][$childof-1] ."/". $passedurl;		// build URL based on passed CHILDOF
	} else {
		$securl 	= 	$SECTIONS['url'][$childof-1] ."/". $passedurl;		// build URL based on passed CHILDOF
		$childof	= 	$SECTIONS['childof'][$childof-1];					// next parent

	hasChildren($SECTIONS, $securl, $childof);
}

//return $securl;
echo $securl . "<br />";
exit();
}

Now my problem is this. When I echo $securl at the end of the function, it returns the URL string as expected:

/url-one/url-two/url-three (for example)

However, when I echo the $securl value AFTER the function call in my WHILE loop, the first part of the string (e.g. /url-one) is removed from the variable.

Can anyone see why this is?? I have been pulling my hair out for hours!!

Thanks for reading